It's funny how things look different, after one abandons the
collectivist mindset.

It's actually quite hard to do that; I see hints of collectivism all the
time, even around here. Just a subconscious way of looking at the rest
of the human race. For example, it's not unusual to read libertarians
talking about war between countriesas if countries could war.
Countries can't war, any more than countries can think or feel.
It's all just a collection of individuals, some who war, and some (most,
actually) who don't war.

When one has really started to shuck the indoctrination of decades, and
consider people as individuals, the world looks different; war starts to
look really different.

One can imagine a dialog between two members of the ruling class; one an
American, the other in one of what my boy calls "the stans", those
countries north and west of India:

George: "Hey Omar, how are you? How's the family?"

Omar: "Just fine, fine. And yours?"

George: "Just great. Say, the boys and I were talking, and we thought we
could use another war. The natives are gettin' restless! We thought you
might be interested in having us attack you. What do you think?"

Omar: "I don't know George, I have it pretty good here already. Not sure
I really need it."

George: "Come on, Omar! Try to look beyond your goat-tending. You won't
believe how good an American war can be for you."

Omar: "You know damn well I don't have any goats! Oh, ha ha, you were
just joking, you sly bastard! But why do you want a war, anyway?"

George: "Oh, you've been reading our poll numbers lately, haven't you?
We need a boost. Anyway our herd needs thinning. There's nothing like
taking the most aggressive of our peons and sending them all out to be
killed. Of course you know that!"

Omar: "Certainly, I can take advantage of that as well. But wars can be
pretty damn expensive, you know."

George: "Not a problem! Just give us the number of your Swiss bank
account, and you will start seeing a lot of nice fat deposits. And we'll
have our boys put together a back channel to ship you plenty of arms for
your side. And we can set up high volume channels, probably using the
same shipping, to bring your heroin back into the US. Keep our peons
asleep, and our 'justice system' <snort> busy. The point of war is to
make money, not to lose it. You and your boys will be rich beyond your
wildest dreams. Your family will be in 'fat city" forever. And let's not
forget that "fog of war" stuff!"

Omar: "I'm not familiar with the term."

George: "Well you know, in the fog of war, people often disappear.
Particularly, good looking women. Often those women somehow end up in
the ruler's bed for a night or several nights. When you are tired of
her, have her taken out back and put a bullet in her head. Trust me,
Omar, you can stop shagging goats. Unless you prefer them; then you can
get the best looking goats, all you want, ha ha!"

George: "I'll have my boys contact yours. We will cook up some
semi-plausible reasons we have to go to war; ours will be the usual
terrorist nonsense, you can do something with Islam. You know, the
regular stuff. Then we feed it to our propaganda machines. Don't worry,
we have this down to an art by now. Say, I've gotta go, have an
appointment down at the golf course, hah! Be talking at ya!"

Omar: "Goodbye, George. Allah be with you." <snicker>

To be honest, I don't really think it went quite like thatbut it
might as well have done. The results seem to be the same. When you are
not a collectivist, it no longer looks as if countries war with each
other. It's just individuals. Individuals cook up wars.

There are not only (possibly) phony wars like the above, but real wars
toofor the individual. What does that mean?

Well, there are many internet stories and youtubes where "the system"
(that is, some individual or individuals within the system) make war on
some poor schmuck minding his own business. I suppose the recent
prototype is Carl
Drega, but while the victim usually folds, unlike Drega, it is still
war. Now, since people are usually indoctrinated that war is one country
attacking another, they don't realize they are in a war, and respond
inappropriately. Oh, they think, implausibly, that "the system" will
vindicate them. I imagine that happens just enough to keep the
indoctrination intactcan't have the peons thinking the game is
rigged, after all. When one has given up on collectivism though, it
stops looking like a bureaucratic dispute or mistake, and starts to look
like war at the individual level. When someone declares war on you, what
do you do?

Interesting thing about that, I think, is the old saying,
"Si vis
pacem, para bellum." I'm not sure, but I get the feeling that if
you have a reputation for not putting up with crap, you are usually left
alonejust like on a school playground. Bureaucrats know about Carl
Drega too. At least some of them have the sense not to whack a hornet's
nest.

Of course, one does not go to war over mosquito bites. Just like real
mosquitos, we brush them off if we can. But after a while, when a whole
lot of mosquitos are feeding on you, you have to do something about it:
fumigate the swamp. Problem is, each individual mosquito bite does not
look like a provocation, is considered not worth fighting about. So you
are thought unreasonable if you do fight. It's always a question; but I
have a feeling government will be providing a lot of real provocations
in the future, thus solving this dilemma for us.

It's time for people to start thinking through what war is really
about. Get beyond that reflexive collectivist thinking.